Range Revegetation

Remote Sensing

This study was designed to test if grazing behaviors differ between desert adapted Mexican criollo cattle and temperate British beef breeds, and to learn how each breed interacts with environments common to the southwestern U.S. and northwestern Mexico

Directional Virtual Fencing is a patented method to autonomously control an animal's location and its direction of movement by applying bilateral cues that capitalize on innate behavioral responses

Virtual fencing refers to a methodology for controlling free-ranging animals that does not require ground based fencing materials to restrict animal movement. Virtual fencing combines electronics with animal behavior to accomplish low-stress animal control.

Fluorometry is an optically based technique that has only recently been shown to be useful in range animal ecology research for identifying pre- as well as post-digested plant material. This poster traces the evolution of this methodology as a tool to determine botanical composition.

NRCS is currently developing ESDs for much of the rangeland in the western U.S. Many local, State, and National ecologists have provided input towards refining the STM concept and ESD development process

Field data collection for writing Ecological Site Descriptions (ESD) creates a paperwork burden
that reduces efficiency of ESD preparation. The recently developed Rangeland Database and Field
Data Entry System is well suited to managing ESD data

Today’s questions about sustainable land management and threats to the environment demand new kinds of soil information. Policy makers, producers, federal land managers, conservationists, and other soil survey customers need information about management effects on soil and their reversibility

Why does the climate change? What does it mean for New Mexico? How can we respond?

Producers and land managers need information about soil and ecosystem change in order to plan for long-term productivity, conduct monitoring and assessments and predict management effects on soil function. Data collection procedures have been developed by NRCS and the Jornada Experimental Range in cooperation with National Park Service, Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management

There are insufficient resources to remediate or restore all desertified lands and there is usually insufficient time to monitor project success or failure. In response, we have developed simple assessment protocols that can be used to prioritize projects

Soil survey data collection procedures to describe management effects on soil are under development. Four pilot studies were conducted by National Cooperative Soil Survey cooperators (NRCS, NPS, FS, ARS, BLM, U. Idaho) to help craft, test and refine sampling protocols

Land use throughout history has changed to suit the needs of the people, but just as the needs of the people have changed so should the methods employed to cultivate the land

An integrated framework for LD assessment as a part of environmental monitoring of grassland, shrubland and savanna (Agro) ecosystems

Interpretation of assessment and monitoring data requires land classification systems representing spatial variation in ecological potential (ecological sites) coupled to state-and-transition models (STMs) that describe temporal variation in ecological resilience.

Laser devices have been recently developed for use in vegetation monitoring. For this project we evaluated a commercially available, moderately-priced monopod-based laser device. This model was designed to collect point intercept and line intercept data and adapted for use in either the up or down position.

The diversity of endophyte communities mandates “systems biology” approach. We are examining endophyte communities in fourwing saltbush. This requires a multifaced process (chemistry, genetics, microbiology, plant biology, phyllogenetics, and ecology). We expect transformational discoveries

In extreme years, droughts will be intensified and floods will become more common. The gap between water supply and water demand will grow even faster than it is now. Even without a volume reduction, the temporal redistribution of runoff will cause this. In glacier basins, ice melt contributions will initially increase and then be reduced as temperature continues to increase

The functional role of carbonate cemented soil horizons in desert ecosystems: Spatial and temporal dynamics of plant water availability

Global warming effects on snowfields and water supply evaluated using snowmelt modeling and normalized annual data

Chihuahuan Desert grasslands are undergoing a rapid transition to desert scrub conditions. In an effort to remove prairie dogs that are believed to compete with cattle, pastoralists have created a cascade of events promoting shrub expansion and severely reducing the viability of pastoralism within many Chihuahuan Desert ecosystems

Rangeland health experts have shown that the UAV images allow, for the first time, identification of vegetation and landsurface patterns and patches, gap sizes, bare soil percentages, and vegetation type over large areas

UAVs are feasible and effective for rangeland mapping and monitoring. Their advantages outweigh challenges with the potential for spatial pattern analysis and high resolution vegetation mapping

Approaches for mapping and monitoring arid rangelands with object-based image analysis and hyperspatial imagery

Our service to rangelands is restoration - because of degraded conditions, without restoration of ecological functions the arrays of goods and services that can be provided are severely limited. In most cases, restoration cannot be a passive process

Why don’t we prioritize ecological research (and restoration) based on societal outcomes? A (partial) strategy for prioritizing ecological
restoration and related research